Friday, January 09, 2009

Hamas vs. Fatah   [Mark Hemingway]

While James and Andy are discussing Hamas below, I suppose I should mention that I have an article of interest up on the homepage today. I interviewed Jonathan Schanzer, author of the commendable new book Hamas vs. Fatah: The Struggle for Palestine.

Few people seem to realize how the Palestinian nationalist movement is riven with internal strife, and Schanzer does an excellent job explaining the major tensions. The media seems to prefer to frame everything under the guise of Arab-Israeli conflict. Obviously, it's much more complicated. The media all but ignored that very violent and bloody conflict that ensued between Hamas and Fatah following Hamas' election in 2006, and as a result you now have Hamas engaged in a conflict with Israel in Gaza while the Fatah-dominated West Bank is just sitting things out. That's a pretty remarkable development, and understanding the Hamas and Fatah tensions is necessary for getting a handle on the conflict in Gaza.

01/09 12:43 PMShare